CSS: Add CSS to HTML

By Xah Lee. Date: . Last updated: .

3 ways to add CSS

3 ways to add CSS to HTML files.

CSS for Single HTML Tag

If you want to specify a style only for one particular HTML tag in a HTML file, you can embed a attribute style=val inside the tag, like this:

<p>… this is <span style="color:red">RED</span></p>

CSS for Single HTML File

If you want to use CSS only for a single file, you can embed it in HTML file's header using the <style> tag, like this:

<head>

<style>
p {color:red}
</style>

<title>My Title</title>

</head>

This will make all “p” (paragraph) elements red.

CSS for Entire Site

To add CSS in your HTML file, do like this:

…
<head>
<link rel="stylesheet" href="mystyle.css" />
<title>My Title</title>
</head>
…

In the above example, whenever the HTML file is loaded, it will load the file mystyle.css. The <link …> line must be inside the “head” tag.

If you use the above for all your files, then you can control your whole site's appearance by modifying the single CSS file.

CSS Basics